IALA » book review http://learningalternatives.net The International Association for Learning Alternatives Tue, 31 Jan 2012 00:21:58 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.2 A Most Remarkable Book http://learningalternatives.net/weblog/post/728/ http://learningalternatives.net/weblog/post/728/#comments Fri, 10 Oct 2008 02:10:17 +0000 Wayne Jennings http://learningalternatives.net/?p=728 IALA promotes educational choices and there would not be the compelling call for change in district schools if they engaged students more. Here are my comments about an amazing book by an extraordinary teacher in a most democratic program.

If Holden Caulfield Were In My Classroom: Inspiring Love, Creativity and Intelligence in Middle School Students by Bernie Schein is one of the most astonishing books on teaching that I have seen in my 50 years of reading education books. This remarkable teacher of middle school students brought out the real feelings and emotions of students to create authentic people and in the process a classroom of vitality and greater learning. This book takes you inside the lives of adolescents, their fears, hopes, jealousies, dreams and inner selves. He also uses class meeting, trials and the core curriculum as a progressive educator. Every teacher at every level would gain from this engaging, readable book.
]]> http://learningalternatives.net/weblog/post/728/feed/ 0 Online Learning: Growth and Evaluation http://learningalternatives.net/weblog/post/445/ http://learningalternatives.net/weblog/post/445/#comments Fri, 11 Jul 2008 02:46:51 +0000 Wayne Jennings http://learningalternatives.net/?p=445 In a certain to be much talked about book, Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns by Clayton M. Christensen, Curtis W. Johnson, and Michael B. Horn describe how a majority of students will use online learning within a decade. They suggest we must disrupt, that is change, thinking about individualizing learning and schooling. This provocative book follows in the path of earlier “disruptive” and innovative thinking about society and business.

Virtually.jpgWe’ve addressed online learning as the fastest growing section for education change in past entries. You can access this topic by searching our previous entries.

The U.S. Dept. of Education produced Evaluating Online Learning: Challenges and Strategies for Success to address the challenge of meeting diverse needs of online learners and how to assess their learning. This 80 page guide (free online) delves into the technical aspects of data gathering and organizing information for arriving at both formative and summative conclusions about program effectiveness using real school examples.

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